Full assessment day - 3 short interviews and 4 psychometric tests
Not much to say about the interviews other than the fact that they were strength based. However I thought they were something of a mixture between strength and competency based because they want you to use examples in your answer to each question which basically requires you to have experience. I was never asked about what I enjoy doing in my spare time or what I enjoyed about my degree. One question was; When solving a problem do you use only the information that is directly relevant to the problem or all information available to you? Which is a stupid question in my opinion as it obviously depends on the complexity of the problem but the interviewer didn't seem to like that answer and didn't write anything down, he just repeated the question assuming I had misunderstood. That was the first question in that interview so that wasn't exactly a good start.
Also worth noting that when you first go to each interviewer they are told your name by the person who took you there then they find the paper with your name on it. This has the questions they will ask you on it and boxes for the answers. I noticed that in the section with all my details my grade was incorrect. I pointed this out to the interviewer and she corrected it, it occurred to me that this may have been a little test of attention to detail - so keep an eye out for little things like that, although it could have just been an honest mistake.
Maths (21 questions in 30 mins, no calculator)
Told this would be mostly GCSE but was in fact mostly primary school level and only a handful of GCSE level questions.
The paper involved being able to; multiply a pair of 4 digit numbers, divide a 4-digit number by a 1-digit number, square a large 2 digit number where a 'shortcut' can be useful (e.g. 49x49), squaring/cubing an integer lower than 13, finding the cube root of a number (e.g. 27), combining powers through multiplication/division, adding/subtracting 5 and 6 digit numbers, using Pythagoras to find the length of 1 side of a right angled triangle - given the length of the other two, solving a set of 2 simultaneous equations (one unknown was negative, both were 2 digit numbers)
IT aptitude (multiple choice, 50 questions in 60 mins)
Half of the test was based on IT knowledge, the other half was based on logic and reasoning.
IT half consisted of knowing what some acronyms stand for such as HTTP and SQL, as well as how many bits in a byte, being able to rank KB, MB, GB, TB in order or size. There was a large variety of questions in this regard so it can be hard to prepare for.
The aptitude side consisted of; spotting the pattern in a series of shapes/patterns and identifying the next one in the series, following some basic pieces of code and identifying the output.
The final and perhaps hardest question used a made up type of notation with boolean unknown variables (true/false), and a system similar to simultaneous equations but using the made up notation with 4 'equations' and 4 unknowns. We are then asked to identify which of the 4 messy 'equations' cannot be true – there was no need to solve all the 'equations' entirely which some candidates tried to do but there was nowhere near enough time, there was 1 of the equations which readily yields one of the unknowns as true/false and one of the options we are given contradicts this so that one cannot be true.
Verbal reasoning (Multiple choice, 20 questions in 20 mins)
Read some text then answer 2-3 questions using only the information from the text.
No chance to change an answer once you go to next question and time limit can go by quicker than you might expect (only 20 mins).
Venn diagrams and set notation. (50 questions (I think) in 60 mins)
Using a tablet you will select which parts of 3 intersecting groups are given by the set notation, this makes up the bulk of the test. The notation can be a little messy to make it harder to ready – you are given a formulae sheet and plenty of time should you need it.
Other parts of the test involve word problems, involving some more basic arithmetic with no calculator, I found the formula sheet to be completely unnecessary though. I think the hardest question was something like; 120 students in a school are choosing which subjects to study, every fifth student chooses subject A and every seventh student chooses subject B. How many students chose neither subject A nor subject B?
We were given rough paper for working things out on, and if you are dyslexic then you are entitled to extra time (presumably other conditions can give you extra time too) if you mention this to your recruiter – don't leave it until the assessment day to say anything or it will be too late.